Health & Wellness
Photos: The Coney Island Polar Bears Shivered In the New Year
It was 15 degrees at 1pm yesterday, when dozens of nearly naked men and women tore down the long, sandy beach at Coney Island and jumped into the Atlantic Ocean. “Other groups canceled their swims this year because of the cold,” megaphoned the Polar Bear Plunge emcee more than a few times. “But here at Coney Island we always go in the water!”
Brooklyn’s Kambo Shamans Have the Frog Venom You Crave

(Photos: Summer Eldemire)
Slipping out of her corporate job 30 minutes early, Mona meets two friends outside of a graffitied door in Brooklyn. They aren’t there for happy hour, they’re there to be treated with kambo, the poisonous venom of a green frog native to the Amazon basin.
Bushwick ‘Industrial Arts Complex’ Will Have a Food Hall, Too

Images used with permission from The Mann Group.
At first glance, 199 Cook Street looks like a typical three-story warehouse in Bushwick. But wait, is that a fire escape that’s actually up to code? A wheelchair ramp? A concrete grotto? What’s happening here?
Fear of Death? Psychedelics Can Help!

Tricia Eastman (Photo: Dana Jonas)
The answer to the universal fear of death, Tricia Eastman says, may be in using psychedelics to hold a mirror up to the inner psyche.
Eastman, a medicine woman trained in facilitating Iboga and DMT experiences, will give a talk tomorrow on death and psychedelics at East Village herb store The Alchemist’s Kitchen.
Bike Racers Do a Supermarket Sweep of Manhattan to Feed the Homeless

The participants and staff of Cranksgiving 2017 at its Hudson Yards starting point, 11/19/2017. (Photo: Nick McManus)
Over 75 bike riders sprinted around Manhattan’s supermarkets in the cold rain on Saturday for New York City’s 19th annual Cranksgiving charity bike ride. The informal “alleycat” race, held in cities across the world, was described by this year’s organizer, Austin Horse, as “a sudoku board manifest of supermarkets where certain foods have to be bought in specific places with both long and short versions that riders of all levels can follow.” The food went to The Bowery Mission.
Villagers, Another Sweetgreen For Your Queuing Pleasure

(Photos: Daniel Maurer)
Sweetgreen is growing like a weed. The D.C.-born chain just opened a new one. Its 19th New York City location is in Greenwich Village, right off of Union Square and just a few blocks from the outpost that came to Astor Place a year ago.
Turn On, Tune In, Drop Into This Weekend Conference on Psychedelics

Michael Bogenschutz (Photo: Steve Duncan)
Five decades after psychedelics first made their mark on American culture, the promise of psychedelic drugs is being championed by artists, activists, scientists and scholars.
On Oct. 6 to 8, Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics will hold its 11th annual conference which brings together researchers and activists to advocate for expanding the use of the mind-altering in medicine and explore the use of psychedelics in art and culture, says Kevin Balktick, who founded the symposium in 2007.
Williamsburg Gets a Gleaming New Candlelit Yoga Studio

(Photos courtesy of Y7 Studio)
Williamsburg’s transition from a den of debauchery to a shangri-la of health and healing was perhaps best exemplified by More →
Can Hallucinogens Have You Seeing Dollar Signs? Attend ‘The Psychedelics of Money’ to Find Out

Tricia Eastman (Photo: Dana Jonas)
Short on cash or struggling to pay bills? The answer, says Tricia Eastman, may lie in using powerful psychedelics like DMT and Iboga to address internal traumas and expand the mind.
Eastman, a medicine woman who trained in facilitating Iboga and DMT experiences for others at a treatment center in Mexico, will give a talk on money and psychedelics at East Village herb store The Alchemist’s Kitchen.